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I live in Missouri and have spent some time at Cahokia. They have an awesome Visitors Center with a huge display of artifacts there. My wife and I have also vis

by oblib 5y ago

I live in Missouri and have spent some time at Cahokia. They have an awesome Visitors Center with a huge display of artifacts there. My wife and I have also visited several sites in the Yucatan including the museum in Merida where they have a huge number of artifacts. When we mentioned to an employee at the Visitors Center at Cahokia that the art and artifacts were very similar to those we saw in the Yucatan and it seems plausible that those cultures were known to each other they responded with a statement that was a scripted response that denied any connection to any other culture and insisted there is none at all. It sounded exactly like something a lawyer would craft and they ignored everything we brought up that implied their could be any connection. From what I could gather the reason for that is if any connection to a living tribe of indigenous peoples could be proved the privately owned lands surrounding the Cahokia site where there are mounds, and there are a lot of them, could be claimed as sacred sites to those tribes and would have to be returned to them. So my take away is the State of Illinois is actively dissuading research that could provide more insight to who lived there and what actually became of them and anyone who tries to prove otherwise is booted out of the conversation.

tptacek 5y ago
I'm not sure if random conversations at visitors centers are really the way this kind of research proceeds. Illinois mints quite a few archeologists every year, at a series of rather large universities, none of which give even a fraction of a shit about real estate interests around Cahokia.
- oblib 5y ago
  I didn't say archeologists were dismissing the connection. I said the Chokia Park employees were, and they did so in a very scripted manner and refused to even discuss it. Go there and test it out. It was a very strange thing to observe.
  - tptacek 5y ago
    You would like me to go test out what happens when a random person attempts to advance archeological theories by confronting park employees about them?
    - oblib 5y ago
      I've seen more than a few cases when "a random person attempts to advance" human knowledge and was completely dismissed by the "experts" and arrogant jackasses who later found out that random person was right. A great example is where the Monarch Butterflies gather in winter. The guy who came back from Mexico back around the 1980-90s and told others he'd seen them in the mountains in Mexico was called a fool and a liar by all the experts until he showed them the next year. Of course, the Mexicans who lived near the site had known they come there for many generations but no experts had thought to ask them, or they dismissed them if they were told about it. All told I'd estimate I've spent around 30-40 days exploring Mayan sites and the Cahokia Mounds. How much time have you spent on that?
      - tptacek 5y ago
        Zero. I'm not an archeologist.
    - oblib 5y ago
      I did not "confront" them. I mentioned that some of their artifacts (art) looked very similar to those I'd seen at Mayan sites and they recited a scripted response. When I rephrased my question they recited the script again. I am not saying those Park Rangers are conspiring to hide the truth. I am saying they are not allowed to acknowledge or even discuss the possibility of a connection to any living descendants anywhere.
adolph 5y ago
> So my take away is the State of Illinois is actively dissuading research that could provide more insight to who lived there . . . See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kennewick_Man https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kennewick_Man
Loughla 5y ago
>So my take away is the State of Illinois is actively dissuading research that could provide more insight to who lived there and what actually became of them and anyone who tries to prove otherwise is booted out of the conversation. That's literally what they do, though. They employ a shit-load of experts there to figure out who lived there, what they did, and why they left/what happened to them. STL NPR just ran an interview with the scientist identified in this article about this literal thing. I guess, what I'm saying is that if they're trying to engage in a cover-up, they're doing a terrible job. Also, if a random tourist can put together the pieces, what are the chances that scientists haven't evaluated it? Maybe, if they say no, it is just because there was no substantive connection? Why does everything have to be a conspiracy?
- AlotOfReading 5y ago
  They did. There was a period of about a hundred years where "archaeologists" basically ascribed any particularly large sites in North America to the toltecs or other mesoamerican elites. Such a confused person is how Toltec mounds got its name. These days such a suggestion would be considered along the same lines as a racist version of geocentrism, which is probably why they felt brushed off.
scionthefly 5y ago
Have you been to the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City? Its name made me wary of how it would present native cultures, but they actually are a comprehensive (and massive) museum with large permanent and traveling exhibits on native cultures. I saw their exhibit on Spiro and the mound builder cultures, and they did not pull punches regarding treatment of historical tribal structures and artifacts. https://nationalcowboymuseum.org/ https://nationalcowboymuseum.org/
jcranmer 5y ago
I'm not an archaeologist, but I can already see some reasons to suspect that a lay person's first guess "there must be a connection" would be quickly dismissed. First off, which phase of Yucatan Maya civilization do the artifacts you're referring to come from? Are you looking at Itza phase or Mayapan phase? (I'm assuming in the first place that it's Postclassic Yucatan, given that the shift of Mayan civilization from the highlands to the Yucatan happens during the transition from Classic to Postclassic). One of those is contemporaneous with Cahokia, the other is not. Another question to ask is what are you considering as diagnostic of the art and artifacts? Are these features common enough to indicate influences in local style, or are you misdiagnosing occasional trade goods showing up?
- oblib 5y ago
  I said I've visited several sites in the Yucatan including the museum in Merida where they have a huge number of artifacts. So, it's safe to assume most all of what I saw there was Mayan. It's very possible that some of what I saw at Cahokia is Mayan trade goods and that is why I asked if those cultures could have been in touch with each other. To be clear, I did not say "archeologists deny there is a connection". I said the Park Rangers there denied it with a scripted response and refused to even discuss the possibility Mayans had been there.
  - AlotOfReading 5y ago
    I'm an archaeologist with relevant experience. Long distance, sustained contact between these regions didn't exist. Mayan trade networks are pretty heavily studied and from what we know they didn't extend north much past central Mexico. It's very common for people to see similarities in regions that weren't connected by contact though. People find it very hard to identify cross-cultural relationships in art/design unless they're intimately familiar with the cultural background and language of the designs. As someone who presumably isn't a time traveling precolumbian native, you're doubly alien to their cultural background. It's the same sort of phenomenon as the other-race effect. With enough exposure and practice, you get better at seeing the nuances and differences that weren't immediately apparent. Even archaeologists are affected by this and it only gets better with experience and study. There can also be false similarities in some objects and styles due to convergent evolution. Houses in certain parts of Nepal look remarkably like ancestral puebloan structures. There was no contact, but they converged on broadly similar styles because of similarities in the resources provided by the local environments and the constraints of building good houses. For the record, there's a long history of "theories" that posit mesoamericans came up into what's now the US and built all of the native structures that are there today. These ideas are pretty soundly rejected by the archaeological community and they're also a bit racist. You undoubtedly didn't intend to suggest this, but that's likely how it came across to the ranger. Rangers aren't perfect and sometimes they have bad days. They're generally majority correct though and worth listening to when they shut down discussions.
hattmall 5y ago
I think the Yucatan art we be more where they came from. As where they went though its pretty well known they went east, due to mound building etc. Then they went back west on the trail of tears.
thehappypm 5y ago
Random conspiracy theories.. this isn't reddit.

by oblib 5y ago

tptacek 5y ago

I'm not sure if random conversations at visitors centers are really the way this kind of research proceeds. Illinois mints quite a few archeologists every year, at a series of rather large universities, none of which give even a fraction of a shit about real estate interests around Cahokia.

oblib 5y ago
I didn't say archeologists were dismissing the connection. I said the Chokia Park employees were, and they did so in a very scripted manner and refused to even discuss it. Go there and test it out. It was a very strange thing to observe.
- tptacek 5y ago
  You would like me to go test out what happens when a random person attempts to advance archeological theories by confronting park employees about them?
  - oblib 5y ago
    I've seen more than a few cases when "a random person attempts to advance" human knowledge and was completely dismissed by the "experts" and arrogant jackasses who later found out that random person was right. A great example is where the Monarch Butterflies gather in winter. The guy who came back from Mexico back around the 1980-90s and told others he'd seen them in the mountains in Mexico was called a fool and a liar by all the experts until he showed them the next year. Of course, the Mexicans who lived near the site had known they come there for many generations but no experts had thought to ask them, or they dismissed them if they were told about it. All told I'd estimate I've spent around 30-40 days exploring Mayan sites and the Cahokia Mounds. How much time have you spent on that?
    - tptacek 5y ago
      Zero. I'm not an archeologist.
  - oblib 5y ago
    I did not "confront" them. I mentioned that some of their artifacts (art) looked very similar to those I'd seen at Mayan sites and they recited a scripted response. When I rephrased my question they recited the script again. I am not saying those Park Rangers are conspiring to hide the truth. I am saying they are not allowed to acknowledge or even discuss the possibility of a connection to any living descendants anywhere.

adolph 5y ago

> So my take away is the State of Illinois is actively dissuading research that could provide more insight to who lived there . . . See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kennewick_Man https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kennewick_Man

Loughla 5y ago

>So my take away is the State of Illinois is actively dissuading research that could provide more insight to who lived there and what actually became of them and anyone who tries to prove otherwise is booted out of the conversation. That's literally what they do, though. They employ a shit-load of experts there to figure out who lived there, what they did, and why they left/what happened to them. STL NPR just ran an interview with the scientist identified in this article about this literal thing. I guess, what I'm saying is that if they're trying to engage in a cover-up, they're doing a terrible job. Also, if a random tourist can put together the pieces, what are the chances that scientists haven't evaluated it? Maybe, if they say no, it is just because there was no substantive connection? Why does everything have to be a conspiracy?

AlotOfReading 5y ago
They did. There was a period of about a hundred years where "archaeologists" basically ascribed any particularly large sites in North America to the toltecs or other mesoamerican elites. Such a confused person is how Toltec mounds got its name. These days such a suggestion would be considered along the same lines as a racist version of geocentrism, which is probably why they felt brushed off.

scionthefly 5y ago

Have you been to the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City? Its name made me wary of how it would present native cultures, but they actually are a comprehensive (and massive) museum with large permanent and traveling exhibits on native cultures. I saw their exhibit on Spiro and the mound builder cultures, and they did not pull punches regarding treatment of historical tribal structures and artifacts. https://nationalcowboymuseum.org/ https://nationalcowboymuseum.org/

jcranmer 5y ago

I'm not an archaeologist, but I can already see some reasons to suspect that a lay person's first guess "there must be a connection" would be quickly dismissed. First off, which phase of Yucatan Maya civilization do the artifacts you're referring to come from? Are you looking at Itza phase or Mayapan phase? (I'm assuming in the first place that it's Postclassic Yucatan, given that the shift of Mayan civilization from the highlands to the Yucatan happens during the transition from Classic to Postclassic). One of those is contemporaneous with Cahokia, the other is not. Another question to ask is what are you considering as diagnostic of the art and artifacts? Are these features common enough to indicate influences in local style, or are you misdiagnosing occasional trade goods showing up?

oblib 5y ago
I said I've visited several sites in the Yucatan including the museum in Merida where they have a huge number of artifacts. So, it's safe to assume most all of what I saw there was Mayan. It's very possible that some of what I saw at Cahokia is Mayan trade goods and that is why I asked if those cultures could have been in touch with each other. To be clear, I did not say "archeologists deny there is a connection". I said the Park Rangers there denied it with a scripted response and refused to even discuss the possibility Mayans had been there.
- AlotOfReading 5y ago
  I'm an archaeologist with relevant experience. Long distance, sustained contact between these regions didn't exist. Mayan trade networks are pretty heavily studied and from what we know they didn't extend north much past central Mexico. It's very common for people to see similarities in regions that weren't connected by contact though. People find it very hard to identify cross-cultural relationships in art/design unless they're intimately familiar with the cultural background and language of the designs. As someone who presumably isn't a time traveling precolumbian native, you're doubly alien to their cultural background. It's the same sort of phenomenon as the other-race effect. With enough exposure and practice, you get better at seeing the nuances and differences that weren't immediately apparent. Even archaeologists are affected by this and it only gets better with experience and study. There can also be false similarities in some objects and styles due to convergent evolution. Houses in certain parts of Nepal look remarkably like ancestral puebloan structures. There was no contact, but they converged on broadly similar styles because of similarities in the resources provided by the local environments and the constraints of building good houses. For the record, there's a long history of "theories" that posit mesoamericans came up into what's now the US and built all of the native structures that are there today. These ideas are pretty soundly rejected by the archaeological community and they're also a bit racist. You undoubtedly didn't intend to suggest this, but that's likely how it came across to the ranger. Rangers aren't perfect and sometimes they have bad days. They're generally majority correct though and worth listening to when they shut down discussions.

hattmall 5y ago

I think the Yucatan art we be more where they came from. As where they went though its pretty well known they went east, due to mound building etc. Then they went back west on the trail of tears.

thehappypm 5y ago

Random conspiracy theories.. this isn't reddit.